Monday, 28 January 2013

“You are not Natural Compliant”

One day, after uploading a picture of mine as my BB
Display Picture, a former classmate of mine sent me a message saying “Do you
know that if you really want to go into natural beauty thing, you shouldn’t be
using makeup.” I was really surprised about that statement, because I have never
given anyone the impression that I was into natural beauty. I instantly told
her that I was not into natural beauty or anything, since I use creams with
chemicals on my skin, rather than Shea butter and herbs. I told her my business
is natural hair, not natural look, because the next thing I know, she would say
I should stop wearing earrings, so I could comply with the naturalness. The
funny thing is that I don’t use a lot of makeup, so it’s not like I was looking
like a painted masquerade. In fact, the picture in question is the
picture where I was wearing a purple ankara jacket in this particular post. I in-turn pointed out the fact that she also
uses powder and lip gloss when her lips are dry.

It took another dimension about two weeks later. There
was a very harsh harmattan weather in Lagos the week before Christmas. I did
not see it coming, so I did not step up my moisture level. This made my hair
detangling very difficult. In the end, I lost a lot of hair while washing. I was
so sad, and decided to put my hair in kinky braids till the harmattan goes, in
order to prevent further damage. A week later, I uploaded the pictures below on
my phone.

And then what happened, my friend pinged me again. She
asked if it was my hair 100%. I told her I had to add a little kinky attachment
that weekend because the weather was tearing my hair into pieces. She said I should
have done the twist without attachment, since she thought I was “Natural
Compliant”. At this point, I was really confused. What exactly is the meaning
of ‘Natural Compliant’? What are the boundaries, who makes the rules of what
being Natural Compliant is, when does one stop being Natural Compliant, etc.? So, does the fact that I added a little kinky extension to my hair mean I am no more
natural?

I just told her that my hair normally is always in
twists, even when the weather dealt with it, and it needed extra protection at that
time because it still broke, and that using kinky extensions doesn’t mean you
are not ‘Natural Compliant’ since it doesn’t alter the texture of your hair. And
then she gave me a sarcastic reply like “Yeah- protect your hair by doing tiny
weaves ‘with your hair’ or ‘with attachment’,” to which I replied that I was
trying to protect my ends at that time. The conversation ended there, and I was
happy about the fact that I didn’t have to lash out or ignore her, because I was
tempted to do just that.

So people, what do you think? What is the meaning of
being ‘Natural Compliant’, does using extensions or make up stop us from being
natural, or do you think some people are just taking things too far?

24 comments
:

Funny. The way people react to our choice to keep our hair natural. Someone asked me the other day why I wear a wig if I do not like relaxed hair. I told I did not like my hair relaxed and wearing a wig was my way of protecting my hair(which remains natural,whether I wear wig or not). Really, I think the problem with people like that is ignorance?

This your friend has beef with your hair o, since she has made herself your police over whether you wear make-up of use hair extensions. Which one is her own sef? Who even came up with the word "Natural Compliant"? People just like to place things in boxes and categories. Why can't people be allowed to do whatever suits them without the stereotypes?

That is why when I stopped relaxing my hair, I warned every body never to try to put me in the natural box, my dear, you haven't even heard anything. Just take a trip around YouTube and you'll be amazed how people will try to conform you to something you have no idea of, just because you made a decision to care for your hair

lol, this is why I prefer to use the term "Afro" hair as oppose to Natural Hair. I think the problem is most people still are confused with the definition of natural hair. My mom once asked me why I was using shampoos and conditioner in my hair when it has chemicals and why I was going to braid my hair, when I said i was going to keep my hair natural. I was so so baffled with the question that I just ignored them, since I didn't even know how to answer. I think your friend might as well walk around naked and grow her own foods, to be 100% natural! lol. I know her kind of Natural sha.